Bleeperbike goes offline as city council removes bicycles

Dublin’s first stationless bicycle share scheme, Bleeperbike, is now off-line after Dublin City Council started to remove the bicycles from the streets of the city.

A spokeswoman for Dublin City Council said: “Dublin City Council has removed many bikes from different locations around the city. A lot of complaints have been received regarding the bikes as have requests for the bikes to be removed.”

The bicycles were removed under Section 71 of the Roads Act 1993, which gives the council the power to remove unlicensed items advertising a service from the public footpath or roadway.

The city council has now started the process of drafting by-laws and the matter has been added to the for the city transport committee this Wednesday.

Chairman of the committee, Councillor Ciarán Cuffe (Green Party) said that he is delighted that new companies want to offer new cycling solutions for Dublin, but that the council wants to ensure a level playing field for the range of companies who are interested in providing the service.

Cllr Cuffe said: “We intend discussing draft by-laws for Fourth Generation bikes at the next meeting of Dublin City Council’s Transportation Strategic Policy Committee which meets next Wednesday 28th June in City Hall at 8am.”

“We want to ensure a level playing field for all Fourth Generation bike rental providers. It isn’t fair for one company to jump the gun while several others are waiting for guidance before proceeding. We also want to ensure that the public realm is protected, and that footpaths are unduly cluttered with bikes between rentals,” he said.

“There is clearly a role for Fourth Generation bike rental providers in providing sustainable transport solutions in Dublin.”

Nice move by the council to remove unlicenced items on the public road under Section 71 of the Roads Act 1993. Will be looking to also see them remove vans and cars which advertise services and which are illegally parked on footpaths under the same legislation.

Such as all big cities operating the DB stationless bike rental scheme. Munich has two such schemes and has also designated stations allowed for that as well. You can find bikes lying around almost everywhere.

Deutsche Bahn is what you might call a semi-state rail company who uses the unprofitable callabike system to attract customers to its trains https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsche_Bahn I wonder did they place extra biike racks (at its stations?)

How can you know that Biker? Seems like you can’t. See what they think of them in Shenzen. DCC did not refuse to give permission, the operator refused to wait. That is a very different thing and it does not bode well for the operator’s ability to follow the rules in other ways.

Dublin isn’t Shenzen, and we desperately need a non-station bike share to get people out of those lonely locked-in cars and into the fresh air. Yes, they should have consulted, but perhaps launching early will push the council to build adequate bike parking stand groups in city and suburbs, and facilitate riding bikes instead of thinking in terms of cars, vans, trucks, lorries, motors all the time.

Let me be clear: I am proud that Dublin ditched these bikes. Some call them BSO: Bicycle Shaped Objects, I call it instant rubish. Experience with DB is not that positive and basically any free floating system is destined to fail. One needs Geo Fencing, the digital sister of the docking stations.

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